


Counting Candles

by chronicAngel



Category: Naruto
Genre: Angst, Birthday Party, Birthday Sex, Birthdays, F/M, Fluff, Miscarriage, POV Third Person, Smut
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-31
Updated: 2017-03-31
Packaged: 2018-10-13 05:53:13
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,750
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10507611
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/chronicAngel/pseuds/chronicAngel
Summary: How many loved your moments of glad grace,And loved your beauty with love false or true,But one man loved the pilgrim soul in you,And loved the sorrows of your changing face;-W.B. Yeats





	

The air is cold and musty, but Sakura Uchiha is grateful for it as her red forehead grows even more sleek with sweat, and it takes everything she has not to crush her husband's hand into pulp as he tries to offer her little comfort. Her mind hardly registers her mouth pushing out the words, "You did this to me, you bastard, _I am never having sex with you again!_ " She wants to scream for medication but she is pretty sure the red-haired demon kneeling in front of her in preparation to catch the watermelon she is currently pushing out is past the point of being willing to leave her side, and that the damned sadist is forcing her through this pain on purpose.

Her immediate instinct is to squeeze her thighs together in the hopes that applying pressure might make the pain subside, or at least stifle it a fraction, but she knows that doing so would be bad for their child and so she stares at the ceiling and focuses on the smell of mildew as she screams. She knows that if he had two, Sasuke would be switching hands right now, so she pulls her hand away from his and instead clings to the bed frame, which she can squeeze as tight as she wants, and she tries to ignore the dark purple and black bruises decorating his hand. The colors would be almost pretty if she didn't know what they were, but as is, she winces at the fact that her husband's sole hand is bruised and that she's the one who did that to him, and she groans loudly as Karin tells her _again_ that she's almost there as if that might be reassuring. It's not. It feels like this kid is dragging this out just to torture her. Can you ground a newborn?

But, finally, with a last push before her entire body seems to loosen and cool down exponentially, she hears the cries of her infant as Karin lets Sasuke cut the umbilical cord and takes her into the other room, and if she was less exhausted, she might chase after her threateningly. As is, she lays in bed, tears in her eyes from the pain of childbirth and pelvis throbbing as her husband watches her with the biggest grin she has ever seen him wear, which is just the slightest upturning of his lips to a normal person, but she understands the sentiment behind it. He rests his hand on her shoulder and gives a squeeze, and she ignores the grimace that flashes across his face because of it, instead silently asking him to sit next to her and then leaning her head on his shoulder.

Karin returns shortly and offers her their child (as if there is any chance in hell she is going to turn down holding her newborn), and she can't help but crinkle her nose at the scratchy material of the stained white blanket that their daughter is wrapped in. Sakura notes, tiredly, that she looks just like Sasuke. She has a soft wisp of dark hair that is curling in front of her eye, and Sakura brushes it to the side with shaky fingers to take a closer look at her with a soft smile that banishes any thoughts of the pain.

Eventually, she blinks open wide eyes and sees the faces of her parents, her mother barely keeping tears from spilling over and her father allowing himself to smile almost as wide as a normal person. They name her Sarada without a second thought, and Sakura has to be fought to get some rest.

* * *

When her first birthday rolls around, she has already taken her first steps, and though she doesn't talk much, resembling her father as a quiet child as opposed to her... outspoken mother, she has said a few sentences already. Sakura doesn't take very many days off from the hospital, dedicating herself to being available to people when they need help, but she makes a point of not even being on call for her daughter's birthday. Instead, the girl sits on her shoulders holding a stuffed rabbit tightly to her chest with one arm and clinging to her mother's qipao with the other as they walk from their apartment to the home of one of her mother's closest friends.

"Look at how big you are!" Sakura doesn't have time to react before Naruto is pulling Sarada into his arms and spinning her around, earning a fit of giggles.

Grumbling, Sakura rolls her eyes at him, "I'd like to point out that you saw her a week ago, and three days before that, and we were here for Boruto's birthday just a couple of months ago." Hinata laughs quietly, but Naruto scowls and sticks his tongue out at her as if that is a remotely adult response to being corrected, and he balances Sarada on his hip as he readies his retort.

"Yeah, well, she's bigger now! I read that babies get bigger all the time and she's still a baby so that means she's still getting bigger." He is still sticking his tongue out at her when he finishes, and she sees her toddler mimic the expression, causing her to snort.

Hinata is the next person to hold the small girl, who whines that she still wants Naruto, but settles against her honorary aunt's chest soon enough; she is half asleep by the time Ino arrives, and she appears to have left her own child with her husband (Sai is a bit of a sore spot for Sakura, since he has no filter and she only knows him because he was meant to replace Sasuke). She calls Ino her friend tentatively, as their friendship is still rocky from the harsh rivalry of their childhood, but when they are friends, laughing together and gossiping like teenage girls, she can easily call Ino her best friend. She coos over the small child about how she can't believe how big she already is and that it's already been a year, and she takes the girl from Hinata with a squeal.

They don't have many people at the gathering, just the four who were already there plus Tenten and Lee. Sakura was fond of the other residents of Konohagakure, but she didn't want to overwhelm her daughter and she knew how shy she was, especially if she was already resembling her father this young. Shikamaru and Chōji and the others will be invited to later birthdays, when Sarada is better at dividing her attention, but for now, just the people she considers family will be just fine. The large smile on her face as Tenten offers to take a picture for them (she knows she just barely made it onto the list of people who were invited, and that if it weren't for her relationship with the Hyūga clan, she likely wouldn't be there at all) is a genuine one, and she can't wait to send it to Sasuke when his hawk delivers his next letter.

* * *

When she turns two, she has much more energy. In fact, she has so much energy that Sakura wonders if she isn't somehow distantly related to Naruto, because she likes to spend her time during the day running around their apartment and making mock hand signs that Sakura always worries will result in something even if she knows that her daughter doesn't actually know any jutsu yet. Her husband sent her a letter a few days ago with a small gift for their daughter, a small bracelet with wooden beads that have been painted red, and she recognizes that this is from Suma. She smiles when she reads the note, and puts the bracelet in a box to wrap it for the small girl who will undoubtedly be delighted with the knowledge that her Papa got her something for her birthday even if she barely understands what that means at this point. She keeps the box in the drawer of her nightstand on her side of the bed, something she sticks to even if she knows her husband may not be home for years. She has always hogged the blankets, tugging them to her side whether or not Sasuke was there, the difference being that when he was there, she snaked her legs around one of his and kept her arms wrapped around his torso because he was practically a human furnace and she was happy with the contact. Now, though, she had grown used to her two-year-old coming into her room in the middle of the night, the toddler having been granted a small bed instead of a crib, climbing into bed with her and curling up against her chest tiredly.

She is running around the house and shrieking out a fit of giggles with her shoes on as Sakura gets ready to go to Naruto's in what she is beginning to think is going to be an annual tradition when her daughter's birthday rolls around. She shrieks over and over again that they're going to Uncle Naruto's, and Sakura finds it half-endearing, half-frustrating because she just wants to get the girl to sit still for two seconds so she doesn't have to keep an eye on her to make sure that she doesn't trip and bang her head on a counter while she is too distracted to catch her. Finishing with putting on her sandals, she scoops up the squirming toddler, planting a barrage of kisses on her cheek that would make Naruto's technique look like child's play, and she grins at her daughter's loud shrieks of laughter. She kisses her cheek one last time before smiling, watching as she struggles to breathe and blinks her long lashes at her, wrapping her arms around her mother's neck.

It doesn't take very long for them to get to Naruto's, with Sakura holding her tiny hand and allowing her to skip along next to her instead of carrying her on her shoulders or balancing her on her hip. The same stuffed rabbit her mother had gotten her when she was a baby, which has since been named Chibiusa, is clutched in her other hand, hanging dangerously close to the dirt path that they walk along as she babbles on about how excited she is to see everyone and how _long_ it's been (she emphasizes the long, draws it out dramatically as if she didn't see Naruto just three days ago, though she supposes that must feel like a lifetime to someone this small). Sakura snickers and teases her that she just wants to see Boruto, and her face flushes as she whines. Despite her protests, Sakura knows how excited she really is to see her favorite playmate, or if not him, then to talk to Hinata's abdomen excitedly as if the two-month-old fetus can actually hear her. They all pretend it can.

When they arrive, she yells in excitement and quickly exchanges a hug with Naruto and says hi to Boruto shyly, before running to Hinata and pressing both of her hands and her face to her stomach, where a bump is barely forming, and says in a not-quite-yelling-but-louder-than-usual voice, "Hiii baby." Hinata laughs a little bit and runs a hand through the little girl's hair as she continues, "We all love you sooo much and we're so excited to meet you! So hurry up and come out of there, okay?" At this point, Naruto picks her up and throws her over his shoulder, chuckling quietly.

"Hey, let's not rush 'em too much, huh?" Naruto laughs out, and Sarada screams, but her joy is given away by the big grin on her face as she squirms to be sitting on Naruto's shoulders, making her taller than everyone else in the room.

Eventually, she is put back on the ground and she and Boruto run off to go play, but Sakura catches her to give her the bracelet before she runs away and Sakura doesn't see her again until they are leaving and her toddler is passing out in her arms as she walks back to their apartment. With wide eyes, she immediately slips it onto her wrist. "That's from Papa, okay? So make sure you don't lose it." With an enthusiastic look, she nods and runs off to find Boruto.

* * *

Her third birthday is the same as her second. Her father sends a gift, but this year it is a music box that he got in the Land of Waves from a young woman who had attempted to hit on him, which causes something in Sakura to flare with jealousy, but she knows that Sasuke is more loyal than the average person and that the fact that he thought to send them the music box is proof enough of that. He ends his note by saying how much he loves the both of them, and she suspects that it is because he knows that she will need to hear it to calm her down from a jealous rage, but her heart still flutters when she reads it and she wears a grin as she takes Sarada to Naruto's. Boruto shyly gives her a daffodil, and she suspects that Ino told him that they were her favorite.

* * *

They do not go to Naruto's for her fourth birthday.

Instead, they sit in the office of a medical-nin who specializes in eyes, and while this used to be a doctor only meant for wielders of the Byakugan and the Sharingan (she is not entirely certain their daughter will not inherit the Sharingan, though that is not why they are here), they now provide aids to the vision of future shinobi, mostly in the form of glasses and contacts, so that they will not be restricted during missions by their limited eyesight. She notices, dully, as she sits there and picks at her qipao, that they are the only people in the waiting room as Sarada colors a piece of paper with various colors of ink, something she did not get to do for fun in her childhood.

As she colors one of the people in the picture's hair a shade of red that could only be achieved by an Uzumaki, a young woman with dark, dark hair that looks almost blue in color steps out of a room in the hallway that they sit just outside of and calls her name, even though they only turned the paperwork in a few minutes ago. She is looking down at a clipboard through a pair of round, red glasses as they step into the small room.

There are a couple of regular chairs, and a large cot-shaped seat that reminds her of the hospital she works at that she watches Sarada struggle to climb up onto. She sighs and has a seat in one of the chairs as the doctor performs regular check up procedures.

She closes her eyes as a reflex when the light is shined in them, before being told that no, she _has_ to keep them open, and she struggles to read the letters in the distance before the doctor informs Sakura that she is near-sighted. They step outside of the room and to where they keep the glasses, and the woman asks Sarada what kind she would like, before she, chipper as always, yells, "I want glasses like the pretty lady's!" She points at the red glasses on the woman's face, and the doctor smiles, ruffling her hair and going to find her a pair. When she returns, Sakura pays, internally yelling about how expensive it is just to get her four-year-old a pair of dumbass glasses before they return to the apartment and they both curl up in bed for a nap with the knowledge that they can get her glasses the next day.

* * *

Her smile changes into a grin as they walk into their new house for the first time, something Sakura had been saving for her daughter's birthday because it would mean so much more to see the way her face lit up if she waited. The girl runs through the halls, shouting numbers as she counts the number of bedrooms before running and pausing in front of her mother, "Mama! This house has _three_ bedrooms! That's more than our other house has!"

Laughing softly, Sakura doesn't mention that their apartment had two, and three isn't that many more, as she leans down to pick up her daughter, and for a normal woman of her size who did not train with the legendary Lady Tsunade, she would be getting too big to pick up. "Well, that isn't our house anymore. We live here now."

With a shriek, Sarada's eyes widen. "Really, Mama? Can we keep it?"

"Of course we can, sweetheart. But you're going to have to be good to the house; we wanna wait until Papa comes home so he can see it, and if we're bad to the house, and we hurt it or we break it, then Papa can't come see it." Bringing up Sarada's father is risky, because she knows that her daughter is starting to reach an age where she does not understand why her father is gone and has started to wonder. But she does not react negatively, instead beaming and nodding her promise to be nice to the house so Sasuke can see it some day, and then starts running around again once Sakura puts her down. Chasing after her, she grins, "Hey! Wanna pick your room?"

* * *

For her sixth birthday, their friends come to her home, instead of everyone meeting up at Naruto's like they used to every year; another change is the fact that Ino is the first one to arrive, early enough that Sarada is still in her room napping. Sakura is tired when she opens the door, blinks the exhaustion from her eyes as she puts on a cheerful smile and greets her old friend, inviting her inside for tea, but Ino doesn't actually wait for the invitation to come in, and Sakura doesn't actually mind. They sit on the small couch in the main room of their home and catch up, discussing their children; Inojin has already started working in the flower shop, Ino informs her, and Shikamaru brings Shikadai over so their children can play every day. She hears the wistful sigh when she talks about Shikamaru, and smiles sympathetically.

This is the first year she has invited anyone outside of their tight knit chosen family to celebrate Sarada's birthday, and Temari is practically dragging Shikamaru and Shikadai inside of the home when they arrive, an hour after everyone else. She snickers, familiar with the feigned apathy of the taller boy even as he waves at Sakura and Ino, and then offers a large box to Sarada which Sakura imagines is a birthday present (it is later revealed that it is a shōgi board, and that Shikadai has already started playing and needs a partner; it's only logical that the second smartest child in Konohagakure be the one who plays the part). Sakura can see in her daughter's eyes, though, that the gift that means the most to her is the hibiscus that Boruto gives her. She casts a knowing smile at Ino.

* * *

When she turns seven, she has calmed down significantly, much less energetic than she was as a toddler; she's independent, too, and Sakura is almost sad that her little girl doesn't require her help getting dressed and brushing her hair in the morning anymore.

In the morning, their roles have reversed, with Sarada slipping into Sakura's bedroom and shaking her awake in the mornings to remind her to eat before she has to leave for work, and Sakura has been growing more and more concerned in time that her daughter doubts her these days. She does not want her seven-year-old to have to wake her up in the mornings just so she can go to the hospital that she loves while her daughter is left home alone, something she always feels guilty about. She does not want to grumble in the mornings like a teenager that she would like just a few more minutes of rest as if she is not the mother but the child. She does not want to sit up late at night and cry about the fact that her husband has been gone for years, that she hasn't seen his face since their daughter was only a few months old, that he doesn't know what their child looks like, that their child is more responsible at seven than she was at thirteen. But she does, and it stings, but she goes to sleep and she gets over it until the next night that she can't shove the thoughts that _perhaps Sasuke will never come back_ down anymore. On her birthday, though, Sakura makes sure to wake up first, makes sure that Sarada doesn't have to see her groggy and disoriented, and she spends an hour trying to make udon noodles in black tea broth.

She succeeds, eventually, although Sakura knows that she is not the best cook and that her daughter will only like the meal because it is flavored with one of her favorite things. Black tea is an odd thing to make a broth of, especially for udon (tea broth is generally made with green tea), but she knows that black tea flavored things are Sarada's favorite and thus she makes a point to make it for her on her birthday, even if her cooking isn't that good and her recipes are a bit odd.

Her daughter comes downstairs, blinking sleep from her eyes, and Sakura beams at her, offering the still-steaming bowl of soup to her before she even has the chance to greet her with surprise at her already being awake. She takes the bowl with a raised brow, and sits at the table.

Later, Naruto and Hinata arrive with their children in tow; Boruto is still as energetic as he was as a toddler, happy to run around and play games and drag Sarada into his antics, while Himawari has always been a quiet child, hiding behind her mother with her face poking out around her hip. Despite the fact that she is almost five now, Sakura isn't sure she's heard her say more than a couple sentences in her life. Eagerly, Boruto runs to Sarada when they arrive, and she offers him a shy smile as he asks her if she would like to play, polite even in his insistence (making it sound as if she has some form of choice).

Himawari tugs on his sleeve insistently before the two of them can run off to get lost in whatever adventures they make up, gripping the fabric of the jacket he received a couple of months ago for his own birthday that is, at this point, way too big for him. He glances down at his sister and she gives him a look like she is silently reminding him of something; he looks confused for a moment, before straightening quickly and shouting an 'oh' that announces he has remembered what she is ~~not~~ talking about. They both rush to their mother and tug on her shirt, and she smiles patiently until they say please. Then, she hands them something Sakura is familiar with receiving at this time of year, in a vessel that is more of a formality than they usually bother with, and Boruto takes it with a hurried thank you and rushes back to the newly-seven-year-old girl. She looks confused until he hands her the potted jasmine, and then her face splits into a smile.

* * *

On her eighth birthday, Naruto cannot make it. He was inaugurated as Hokage only six months ago, and as such, he is swamped with paperwork, and though Sarada doesn't show it on her face, she is disappointed that he cannot come. No matter how little Sakura wants to admit it to herself, Naruto has been the father figure to Sarada that she has yearned for while Sasuke is away, and the fact that he, just like her real father, could not make it, likely crushes her little heart. But she doesn't show it, she never shows it, instead she just grins and says that it's fine (because if she didn't, if she had cried and said how she really felt, the Hokage would have dropped everything to make it and even at eight she knows that he can't do that), and happily accepts the pansy that Boruto gives her.

* * *

He makes it to her ninth birthday, though he is later than everyone else; she forgives him for his lateness, launching herself at him to hug him and wrapping her arms tightly around his knees until he picks her up, and she knows that a civilian wouldn't be able to anymore. He wishes her a happy birthday and gives her a book that he says only the Hokage has access to, and she points out that actually, she is not the Hokage and so more than just the Hokage has access to it now. He laughs and grins at her, and admits that that's true, but he's sure she will be some day. She ignores the fact that this book can't possibly be that important if Naruto is willing to give it away in favor of marveling at the comment, beaming when she realizes that the Hokage has practically just given her his blessing, and on her birthday no less.

* * *

Yellow.

That is the color of the tulip that Boruto gives her for her tenth birthday, and she doesn't know the meaning behind many flowers, but she knows what the yellow tulip means because it is her Aunt Ino's favorite (and she tries not to notice that Shikamaru gives Ino one for her birthday every year, and she tries just as hard not to notice how sad Ino gets when she receives it because she knows exactly what it means). But she also knows Boruto, and she knows that he doesn't know the meaning of the flower, and she also knows that Ino is the one who picks out the flower he gives to her every year because she is not an idiot.

Still, she feels like one as her heart flutters with her smile when she receives it, and she can't explain the feeling of her heart skipping a beat because at the age of nine, she doesn't actually know what a crush is, and if she did, she would deny wholeheartedly that she harbored one for Boruto. But still, upon receiving the yellow tulip, she reminds herself of the words Ino had told her the first time she asked what it meant when she noticed Shikamaru give her one.

_"It means one-sided love, Sarada. And some day, if you get one, that's practically a confession right there. I promise, little red, that some day you'll get them, and when that happens, you'll know how that person feels._ " She grins for the rest of the day.

* * *

When they are eleven, she is too busy training to have a proper birthday celebration, but she does pause when Boruto asks her if she has a minute (she knows it is to give her her flower, and she wonders absentmindedly what Ino picked out for him this year). She wants to be irritated when he takes a few minutes of her time making small talk, because she will always wait for Boruto and she wants to get back to training now, but she can't bring herself to muster up a glare, instead laughing when he cracks a joke and maintaining a smile. After a long few minutes, where he has her wheezing because he has made her laugh too hard, he grins and tells her happy birthday, before offering her a single violet, which she accepts, as she does every year.

* * *

Her twelfth birthday is rainy, and she can't remember a time before in her life when it has rained on her birthday, but she thinks that the weather suits her mood as she bursts into tears almost immediately after waking up. She is not sad, she realizes, after too much time has passed and she has been crying in her bed for nearly twenty minutes; she is crying because she is twelve years old and for the first time her father is there for her birthday. She is crying because she is so overwhelmed with joy that this is the only way she knows to express the intensity of the feeling, even if no one is there to witness.

She has finally stopped when Papa comes to wake her up.

Her father brews her a cup of hot black tea and makes her breakfast, rice balls and miso soup, while her mother showers and gets ready for the day, since she knows they will have company. Sarada knows her father is not the social type, so she wonders how he is going to deal with so many people who he has not seen in years being in their home to celebrate her birthday-- if he is going to deal with it at all, or if he will just wander away until he knows everyone has left.

Naruto arrives hours later, with his wife and children in tow, and she sees her father's eyebrow twitch as the quiet is interrupted by Naruto letting himself in, and Hinata profusely apologizing for it. This is the only hint of emotion he allows to reveal his annoyance with the blond man as he ruffles his hair.

"Sasuke! I didn't expect you to still be here, so you're gonna be back for a while, huh?" Naruto says this as if he expects someone else who was not the Hokage to have assigned him a mission to be away on, but her father hums in quiet agreement nonetheless and stands to make more tea. Himawari moves to sit in a chair next to Sarada, talking quietly but talking to her nonetheless. She is excited to report that the small garden she has started with her mother is thriving, and that she knows Sarada doesn't like them very much but they've got plenty of tomatoes and she has heard it's one of her dad's favorite foods. Eventually, Boruto interrupts them, assuming that they are talking about something that isn't very important (well, he isn't wrong).

Himawari gives him a wide-eyed look before getting up and walking away, leaving him to take the seat she was just in and lean his elbows on the table, giving Sarada an expectant look as if he thinks she has something to say and is waiting for her to spit it out. Awkwardly, she coughs out a greeting, preparing an excuse to run to her room just to avoid some awkward conversation (she notes, bitterly, in the back of her mind, that things have never been awkward between them, but then she realizes that her father has been staring him down for the past hour and she thinks she understands), but he starts talking soon enough. He tells her happy birthday, and that he's really glad she was born, which makes her snort, and then he gives her a morning glory.

* * *

She kisses Mitsuki on their last mission, an impulse at best, as neither of them harbors feelings for the other (she has a creeping suspicion that he isn't interested in romance at all, which is not abnormal for a thirteen year old boy), but it is her first kiss and she does not regret it. Neither of them mentions it afterward, and Boruto, who arrived on the scene to make sure they were okay right as it started, sulks behind them.

On her thirteenth birthday, which is only a week later, Boruto looks irritated when he comes to their house, the house she grew up in, but he is polite and he looks almost soft when he gives her a yellow rose, before he stalks away to sit on the couch. She raises a brow at him. She doesn't remember what yellow roses mean.

* * *

They spend her fourteenth birthday in the hospital, and it is not Sarada who needs to be hospitalized. Her father paces in the waiting room, and she attempts to catch his wrist to get him to calm down because she knows what he is going through, she has already been there and come back from it. Her mother, at four months pregnant, is showing all of the signs of a period, and it makes Sarada feel guilty because when she heard about the pregnancy initially she wished it wasn't true. Now, she will not have a sibling who is fourteen years younger than her, something she had resented and never wanted because normal people have their second child two or three years after the first, but her parents were going to wait until she was fourteen; but the thought keeps repeating itself: she is not to have a much younger sibling. Instead, she will have a dead one.

* * *

When she is fifteen, her parents have already recovered, much to her relief, and they wear smiles even though the fifteenth anniversary of her birth is also the one year anniversary of her brother's death. Some people who arrive to celebrate her birthday try to seem solemn, but when they see that Sakura and Sasuke are not mourning, they adopt they same chipper attitude that makes Sarada wonder if everyone is just acting to make her feel better.

She is relieved when her best friend arrives, and she wraps her arms tightly around him, burying her face in his shoulder and hoping to borrow some of his infinite strength because she feels as if she is the only one who remembers what happened this day last year.

She lets out a muffled sob and he lifts a hand to rest on the back of her head, shushing her as his other arm wraps around her waist and pulls her closer until her chest is pressed to his and she is practically clinging to him for dear life. Her breath is hot and wet on his neck and he eventually pulls her outside to get her away from everyone there to see the birthday girl, for which she is grateful as she sits down on the grass outside of their home. He sits next to her, resting a hand on her shoulder and giving it a squeeze without trying to push her boundaries; he knows she'll talk to him when she's ready.

Eventually, the dam breaks and she gushes about how she lost her baby brother, even if he wasn't technically alive yet, wasn't considered viable; that doesn't matter because he was her baby brother and even if she complained she was excited and she wanted him to be here and then he wasn't. He was gone. He _is_ gone. He pauses, taking all of this in, and gently scoots closer, bumping her shoulder with his in an attempt to console her silently; he goes on to talk about how he wishes he could say he understands, but he doesn't, and he's sorry. If he had lost Himawari, he doesn't know what he'd do, but he didn't and so he's not going to pretend like he knows what she's going through, and she is so grateful for that, like everything else he has done today, because she is so sick of people trying to sympathize with her and pretend like they have any idea how she feels when they don't and they all know that they don't.

She lifts her head to kiss his cheek, and he tenses slightly, eyes going wide in confusion for a moment before he settles, deciding to just accept that it happened without questioning her about it, and like everything else he has done for her today, she is grateful for that, too. He tilts his head sideways and rests it on top of hers, closing his eyes with a sigh and just sitting there with her for a few minutes until they hear someone calling them to come inside for whatever unspecified reason. She pushes herself up first, investigating her shorts for grass stains before stretching and slowly walking inside, her kiss to his cheek being left behind her. She never finds out what flower he has gotten her this year, because he instead just picks one of the wildflowers from her yard, but for some reason it means more to her than anything from a shop would.

* * *

On her sixteenth birthday, she does not cry. She does not cry because her brother has been dead for two years now, she does not cry because Naruto could not make it, she does not cry because her father is on the road, she does not cry about anything because she has no reason to. Her brother is still dead, but she has adjusted to the fact that that will never change; the Hokage hasn't missed one of her birthdays since her eighth, since it didn't take a genius to tell that she was faking the smile when she said it was fine, it didn't take a genius to tell that it was breaking her little heart because he was one of the most important people in her life; her father hasn't left her since he came back four and a half years ago, when she was eleven, or at least, not on a mission more long term than her own usual ones.

Boruto arrives first, without his family, and it makes Sarada question him because, while they have certainly spent time together without their parents, they are teammates and friends, she doesn't think he has ever come to her house alone. He explains, hastily, before she even has time to voice her question, that he has to leave for a mission with Shikadai and Inojin and thus won't be here for the real party, but he still wanted to give her her gift. She expects a flower. She expects him to give her some new kind of flower that he hasn't given her before, since it is a new one every year, but instead, he presses his lips to hers hesitantly, clearly unsure of the action. Despite his reluctance, she leans into it, her hand resting on his chest and gripping his shirt.

She backs into the door, pulling him against her, and her breaths are hot in a very different way from the last time they kissed (she doesn't bother to correct herself that no, they didn't _kiss,_ she had pecked him on the cheek, it was different).

She can tell that he wants to go further but is afraid to, and she isn't sure what he is afraid of, but she isn't going to push him to do anything that he isn't ready for and so, with a final running of her fingers through his hair, she pulls away. Their breathing is heavy, but she doesn't regret the kiss even a little bit, almost wanting to lean in to kiss him again but not daring to exit his comfort zone.

Awkwardly, standing so close she can feel his breath on her lips as he talks, he excuses himself, saying that he has to leave in an hour. He goes to move away, but she holds him back at first, holding him close and keeping her face within inches of his without actually pressing her lips to his, just enjoying the intimacy of closeness before she finally lets him go. His last exhale against her lips is shaky and he promises to finish what he started when he sees her again, and she says that she'll hold him to it before watching him leave and going back inside, face flushing as her mother gives her a knowing look.

Later, Himawari gives her sunflowers, saying that they are from Boruto and explaining that he is away on a mission, but she knows. Still, she smiles.

* * *

She doesn't see Boruto again until her seventeenth birthday, a full year after he left and much, much later than she was expecting him to get back; he said he was going on a mission and she expected him to be gone for a few days, maybe a couple of weeks at the most. But at about the three months mark she decides that he has died and will never come back, and she mourns, and no matter how much she wants to, or wants to pretend that she has, she has not moved on. She stands, currently, in the middle of the woods, throwing shuriken precisely at marks on the trees around her and stifling tears because she remembers, sadly, that they used to practice here _together._

His awkward grin rises to the surface of her memory, the way that he laughed breathily when he was embarrassed in the attempt to dismiss the feeling and the way that his eyes closed when he grinned as almost an instinct, an expression he inherited from his father like most of his appearance, the way his pale blue eyes could be swimming with emotion even when he tried to pretend he was calm, which he was so terrible at but it was always still reassuring to see that he was trying to be strong for her sake-- her breath hitches and she realizes how tight her chest is. She misses him. More than she has missed anyone other than perhaps her father (only perhaps), she misses Boruto Uzumaki and the thought that he is dead kills her inside every time she remembers that that is true, that _has_ to be true. He would never just leave home, Boruto isn't-- _wasn't_ \-- the type even if he always said he wanted to be like the great Sasuke Uchiha.

She falls to her knees on the ground, doesn't even hear the sound of metal piercing bark as her shuriken hits its mark perfectly, and she sobs, feeling the force of it shake her entire body down to her core. She wishes he was there. She wishes he was there to wrap his arms around her and just let her cry in silence with his warmth to comfort her, his fingers running through her hair naturally, almost out of instinct, in a way he has learned in their years growing up together soothes her.

And as soon as she wishes it, she can feel it happening, and she wonders if she has somehow let herself get caught in a genjutsu (nevermind the fact that no one is around, no one even knows where this place is). "I'm so sorry, Sarada..."

Her eyes widen as she realizes that this can't be a genjutsu, this is too real and if this was a genjutsu then he wouldn't be apologizing to her, he would be dying or scolding her, or maybe everything would be fine and she wouldn't be crying and it would be as if nothing had happened, as if he hadn't been gone for the last year. She wants to kiss him immediately, to turn around and lock his lips in hers, but when she turns around, she instead finds her fist connecting with his jaw, knocking him back into a tree. He doesn't have time to speak again before she is punching his shoulder, and then aiming for his stomach, which he does, her fist making contact with the tree and breaking its trunk in half. Her mother has been teaching her chakra control and she is surprised that this is the situation she uses it in. She wastes no time in turning to face him and lunging, her hand straight and jabbing at his shoulder and then his chest, and he falls to the ground, staring up at her with wide eyes as she continues to throw punches in his direction. He trips her, eventually, concluding that's the only way to get her to stop, and he gets up, gasping for air.

"Sarada, what the fuck?!" She doesn't know if she's ever heard him swear before, but she's not surprised that he has picked up the habit when considering who his father and mentor are, and when considering that he has spent the last year _alive_ and _breathing_ with Shikadai Nara and Inojin Yamanaka, and he wasn't dead and he's seventeen so of _course_ he's swearing and oh Kami, she feels tears spilling over again as she sobs.

"You jerk!" She screams, only she chokes on a sob immediately afterward, so it sounds pitiful and strangled and like she is struggling just to speak to him because she cannot contain herself. His eyes are wider now, and she stands, shaking in front of him as she cries and continues before he has to ask her to elaborate, "I thought you were dead! You could have told me you'd be gone for a year! You could have told me you were leaving for so long!" She sobs again, and he steps forward.

She doesn't have the strength to push him away as he wraps his arms around her, pulling her into his chest and running his fingers through her hair the way she had just wished he would do. She sobs again, closes her eyes tightly. "I thought you were dead..."

"But I wasn't." The three words are whispered, but urgent, perhaps pleading, and she lifts her head to look at him, to see his eyes (still wide and still so shockingly light like they had been their entire lives, unlike his sister's electric blue that she inherited from their father). It doesn't take her very long to press her face forward, to connect their lips and impatiently tug on his hair, her mood changing in an instant after connecting with those eyes because he is here and alive and even if this isn't real, she wants to relish in the illusion while it lasts. He shrugs his jacket off lazily, lifting a hand to her cheek once it has fallen to the ground and moving his free arm to wrap around her waist. She pushes him back against the very tree her shuriken is sticking out of, and they barely miss the handle as his back slams into the trunk.

Her hands slip up his shirt, and she mercilessly drags her nails down his chest, which causes him to groan against her lips and grab her wrists, pulling her hands away from his skin and switching their positions quickly, roughly pushing her into the tree with her hands pinned above her head. She shudders, but doesn't discourage him, in fact tilting her head and humming her approval when he starts to kiss at her neck, and actually moaning when he bites, and her face flushes a red that would rival her mother's qipao. Her thoughts are ripped away from anything resembling her mother as he reaches the point where she can currently feel her heart pounding in her throat, and begins to suck on the skin, breath hitching as she tries desperately to pull him closer.

She loses track of time as clothes begin to come off, can only keep track of the fact that they seem to be dancing with how well their movements flow together as he pushes her shirt up and then moves to unclasp her bra as she pushes his shirt over his head, and he finishes and removes it at the same time she needs him to lift his arms, so it seems almost like it had been timed. He doesn't pin her arms to the tree again as they resume their previous position, instead resting his hands on her hips and dipping his head forward to catch her lips again while he pulls her hips to his, and she gasps at the contact before running her fingers into his hair, brushing her nails gently along his scalp in a way that she can hear makes his breath hitch. After a second, and clearly not without hesitation, he pulls away, breathing heavy.

"It's your birthday," he says it as if she might have forgotten, but she knows that he is saying it to remind himself, to pull him out of the moment before he gets lost in it forever, and she can't help but smile at the old habit. Straightening, he nods, continuing, "It's your birthday! Which means that I need to give you your flower." She snorts, raising a brow at him as he moves to his pack and starts searching for it, eventually swearing once she assumes he has found it.

When he comes back to her, his thumb is bleeding, and the small bead of blood that is developing on his finger is the same color as the rose he is offering her. The thorns left on tells her that he got this himself, from a garden of some sort, and not from a store.

She pays close attention to the flower, very slowly breaking the thorns off of the stem. Her mother used to compare her to a rose, when she first started training, telling her that she was just as beautiful with thorns just as sharp and deadly as a rose's, and that only the strongest and most persistent of people could break her thorns. She's one of those people, strong enough and persistent enough to break the thorns of a rose, but she wonders now if Boruto isn't one of those people as well; if she is a rose, then he is definitely the one removing her thorns.

When she finishes snapping them off, she lifts her gaze to him, grinning. She's still shirtless, as she's sure he'll notice soon enough, and a shiver runs up her spine as a breeze blows that ruffles the leaves on the trees around them and cools her skin; she hadn't realized how sweaty she is, but now, it's hard to ignore. If he notices, he doesn't seem to care, stepping forward and dipping his head to catch her lips and lifting her legs so she straddling him while her back is scratched lightly by the bark, and she isn't sure if she's hissing in pain or pleasure through her teeth because _dear Kami she hopes she isn't a masochist but she knows that doesn't feel bad to her._ Her gut is tight in the most pleasant way, unlike fear or fatigue, and she isn't sure if the coil her guts have wound themselves into tightens or loosens when he accidentally grinds against her, but she sees his face flush and she presses closer before she loses her confidence.

Time passes much faster than it feels like it does, and Sarada can't stifle a gasp even as she bites Boruto's shoulder when he hesitantly pushes into her, reality rushing back to her in a crushing combination of pain and excruciating pleasure. She feels like someone is trying to stretch her when she is not made of something that can be stretched, an unbearable feeling of combined tightness and fullness and just general strain but she pushes the feeling down to focus on how wide his eyes are, she imagines because he never expected this to happen. Hoped, maybe, but he likely never thought this would happen. After all, she thought he was dead until only an hour or so ago, and now he was holding her against a tree and-- as her mind is brought back to what they're doing, she must make a face, because he stops moving and that is _so much worse_ than the pain she was feeling before (possibly because it hasn't entirely gone away, now it is just still).

"I'm f-fine," she's a stuttering mess, but for whatever reason, he chooses to believe her, which she is thankful for as he continues the slow, unsteady, nervous movement of his hips, which pulls noises out of her that make her face flush. Slowly, the pain starts to fade away, and she can focus on the new feeling that she can't exactly describe, but she's noticed that it does feel like that coil in her gut is rapidly loosening a bit and then growing twice as taut which makes her fingernails dig into the skin of his back and shoulders. Closing her eyes and biting her lip, she tries desperately to pull him closer, and based on his smirk and the way he shifts, she thinks that he notices.

It doesn't take him very long to come undone, a couple of minutes tops, but she notices how he struggles to keep going even after that to make sure that she reaches the breaking point. She almost pities him for it, because even after a year, he is so wrapped around her finger that he would cause himself actual pain just to make her happy; any sense of pity she has disappears as she feels the coil loosen all at once. The noise that she makes is something between a sigh and a gasp, and she doesn't even care, moving her hand around until it finds one of his and squeezing it until she has calmed down and they separate.

"I love you, you know..."

* * *

Eighteen does not feel very different from seventeen, aside from the fact that she is celebrating it differently. For one, on her seventeenth birthday, her mother and father were not seated across a table from her like this was an interrogation while she sat in a chair feeling as if holes were being burned into her by her father's eyes; for two, her now boyfriend is not with her to shield her from her parents' stares; and for three, she hasn't cried at all in the last year.

Her father stays completely still, his fingers drumming on the table as if he expects her to say something, while her mother struggles with sitting versus standing and pacing around their moderate kitchen.

Eventually, after many attempts to speak (opening and closing their mouths on all three of their parts), it is her father who breaks the silence, which is already a sign that something is wrong since her father is never the one to start up a conversation. "Sarada." She doesn't think that her name has ever had such a powerful effect on her, but she feels a shiver run up her spine at how firm the three syllables sound, and she thinks her face pales a bit. Her mother must notice, because she rests a hand on her father's shoulder and gives him a look as if attempting to rush him to the point; she's not sure if she finds this reassuring or more nerve-wracking. Clearing his throat, he makes eye contact with her, and she feels inexplicably small, "As I'm sure you're aware, you turn eighteen today."

She thinks that her heart lurches in her chest; she feels as if it is in her throat and she might puke the organ up if he says what she thinks he's about to say, "Hn." It's a quiet noise of affirmation that every member of the Uchiha clan is known for making, much more cool and collected than she actually feels as her brain runs at a hundred miles per minute trying to fill the strangling silence again. He looks up to her mother, either for reassurance or to make sure what he is about to say is okay with her, and it makes her feel like she is isolated as they have a silent conversation that she has not been invited to. They are staring intently at each other, likely having aforementioned silent conversation because they seem to know each other that well, and the silence is so heavy to her that she has to speak up before it suffocates her, "Papa, if this is about adulthood and the responsibilities that come with that, I already know about all of that stuff and I'm ready for it. I've been studying under the Lord Hokage for years, I'm a great shinobi, Boruto has offered to let me move into his apartment with him, and I know what I wanna be when I grow up." She said the last sentence mockingly, but they still laughed.

"We aren't kicking you out, honey." It was her mother who said it, her father only giving a small nod of confirmation, and despite the fact that she didn't show it outwardly, she did feel her heart slow back to a normal pace and the previously tense muscles in her shoulders relax a fraction. "We already know that you're prepared for all of that stuff, you forget that we've been there for all of this with you. We aren't trying to get rid of you or rush you into adulthood."

Papa must see the way that her eyebrows furrow slightly in confusion as she chews at the inside of her lower lip in thought, a habit that she inherited from her mother but one that he is still familiar with, because he speaks up again, "But, since you are an adult now, Sakura and I, but particularly I, think that you are ready to begin handling some adult responsibilities." Sarada is always taken aback by the fact her father uses her mother's name when talking to her. No one else does.

Sarada almost wants to be offended. She has just mentioned the adult responsibilities she partakes in, and the adult responsibilities she intends to continue to adopt! What do they think she's not doing? What will make her good enough? She stops at that thought, looking with wide eyes at her parents.

Her mother is smiling at her like she has just missed some big reveal, something incredibly positive, but she is certain that nothing has been said, so she isn't sure why she is smiling at her like that. Nevertheless, she nervously smiles back, her eyes flashing between her parents as if there is some unread message in the small space between them that she might find if she looks close enough. Unfortunately, there are no words hanging visibly in the air, and she must wait for her father to yet again break the silence to learn whatever it is they plan to tell her. "The paperwork was finalized last week. You are officially the Uchiha clan head." She almost wants to scream in delight.

Boruto gives her a flower later. Hydrangeas. "Proud of you."

**Author's Note:**

> The flower idea occurred to me later, and all of the flower symbolism here is from hanakotoba, which is the flower language in Japan, meaning that the flower meanings should not be used in English context.


End file.
